


A Stretch Of Mortal Time

by Shamandalie



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Half-Sibling Incest, M/M, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-22
Updated: 2015-02-22
Packaged: 2018-03-14 14:56:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3414920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shamandalie/pseuds/Shamandalie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Robb sees Talisa for the first time, at the battlefield, he also sees Jon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Stretch Of Mortal Time

When Robb sees Talisa for the first time, at the battlefield, he also sees Jon.

Well, it wasn't really weird in his case - he noticed that after they went their separate ways, almost everything started to remind him of his brother: conversations he heard on topics he discussed with him years ago, the way someone moved, the way someone smiled, hair of some lord's squire. Quite embarrassing, really. But Talisa... Talisa was the worst (or the best, Robb wasn't sure). When he looked at her, her beauty took his breath away. Her dark hair, and chocolate brown big eyes, both so, so painfully familiar, made his heart ache. If she had curls, he probably would have cried. He looked at her and for a moment he forgot that he was at war, that he was the king. He was just a boy, a boy who desperately wanted to go back to his home, to Winterfell. To Jon.

But Jon wasn't in Winterfell, not anymore, and Robb couldn't return.

Talisa impressed him. She was stubborn, determined and confident, and he couldn't stop thinking about how she didn't pay attention to colours, to emblems, when someone needed her help. Jon would admire her, too. (He didn't know when he started judging people by thinking what would have Jon thought about them, but. There he was.) Hell, if Jon was at her place, he would probably do the same.

So, the night after meeting Talisa, he entertained himself by imagining Jon being in her place. His curls, laying on his temple, getting into his eyes. He would have brush them away with this manner of his, while looking with concern at some wound of Lannister or Stark man. He imagined the way he would smile reassuringly, and how his smile would surely fade into solemn after turning away from his last patient.

He imagined, no, he remembered, how Jon would smile at him after a tiring day, after a day that made him lose his faith in humanity.

 

_Jon entered your chamber and smiled. His eyes stayed sad and big, corners of his mouth barely raised, but what a beautiful smile it was, purely because it was reserved only for you._

_'What happened?' you asked, even though you already knew._

_Jon just shook his head, looking at the flames burning brightly in the fireplace. You opened your arms._

_'Come here'_

_Jon shook his head again, but something in shape of smile hide in his eyes. He sat on your lap and you wrapped your arms around him, sighing contentedly. You loved to do that since you've noticed that you're taller than him (even though he was faster, stronger and heavy). In those moments, you truly felt that he was yours and you were his. Jon snuggled his face into your neck and you kissed his hair._

_'I thought you stopped caring about what others have to say, Jon.'_

_Jon sighed. He laid his hand on your cheek, cupping it slightly._

_'I did. Today was bad, that's all.'_

_You held him close and waited for him to continue. '_

_It's stupid. I lost to Theon twice during practice, your mother said few words, Sansa said something she didn't officially mean to, and here I am. Mopping like three year old.'_

_You kissed him, slowly, lips barely touching at first. He shuffled his hand through your auburn hair. He pulled one strand while deepening the kiss and you moaned a little. You laid him down on your bed, kissing his neck, his jaw, biting his earlobe lightly. You looked him in the eyes when you're were undressing him, and, gods, you loved him so much in this moment. You wanted to tell him that, you wanted to tell everyone. You wanted to write poems about his hair and his eyes, you wanted everyone to know you were his. But you couldn't do, couldn't have, what you wanted. So you just kissed him more passionately, instead._

 

Robb was biting his hand to stop moans from escaping his lips. Second hand was gripped tightly around his erect member. Gods, he really shouldn't be getting himself off by imagining his brother's lips around his cock while his royal guard was standing right outside his tent, he knew that, but. It's been so long.

***

Next time he saw the girl, he also noticed that Talisa was funny and intelligent and that he wanted to spend more time with her. Somehow, it didn't feel like breaking the promise he and Jon made.

That stupid vow they said to each other before. Before everything happened. Before they were men, not just boys.

_Solitude of Godswood has always been appealing to Jon. It was silent, thoughtful, like the bastard himself. You didn't like it much, though, and only times you found yourself being there was when Jon was your companion. And during those times, the things you were doing together weren't entirely respectful towards the place of worship you were in. Not that time, though. That time, you were just sitting in silence, Jon's head laying on your chest, your fingers tracing their way through your brother's hair. It was one of those days when Jon had doubts, when he thought you were abomination, that he could bring 'even bigger' dishonor on Stark family than he 'already did' when father brought him along to Winterfell, if someone discovered them._

_'Jon,' you said his name again, and once again, it gained you no response. 'Jon, talk to me.'_

_He sighed._

_'I - Robb. We should stop.'_

_'Stop what?'_

_'You know what.'_

_At first, when you two grew closer, when it became impossible to be more intimate with each other than you already were, those conversations scared you. Scared that you will lose him, that maybe he's right. Now you only felt anger._

_'No, I don't. Should we stop loving each other, Jon? Should we start pretending that we've never been more than just brothers? Well, you can try. But I'm not able to do that.' you hissed._

_You felt your brother stiffen. He turned around, kneeling in front of you, with his dark eyes oh, so sad. '_

_You're the heir to Winterfell, Robb,' you tried to say something, but he laid his finger on your mouth, 'Someday you will have to marry and bed some lady from good house. I don't want us to stop, I don't care if it's wrong, not anymore, but - I just keep imagining. What will happen to me, when you fall in love with someone else. What will happen to me, when you start your own, happy family and leave me. It will hurt, Robb. I don't want to hurt so much if I can prevent it.' '_

_I will never leave you,' you said forcefully, taking his face between your hands, looking into his eyes, 'I promise. I don't know what will happen during our lives but I promise you. I will never leave you. I will never love anyone as much as I love you.'_

_Jon didn't look convinced. Maybe he knew that you were too young to make promises like this. Too young to keep it, that's for sure. But he still leaned in and kissed you. '_ _'_

_'I promise, too. I'll love you. Forever.'_

 

Talking with Talisa was entertaining, and he liked her just for the way she was, but sometimes, when he wasn't concentrating strong enough, he would catch himself comparing the girl to Jon, seeing Jon in some of her moves, imagining that it was Jon who stood in front of him, not her. It was wrong, he knew that, but it wasn't the first time when doing wrong things tasted too good to stop.

***

She was beautiful, so so beautiful. And yet when he kissed her, it didn't feel like the world was spinning, he didn't feel pieces falling into right place, like he felt first time he kissed Jon. But it wasn't a surprise - he didn't expect anything close to sensations he felt with Jon to happen again, gods, he promised he'll never feel this way again. And he didn't. For Talisa, he only felt lust. His throat wasn't clenched from emotions, his chest didn't feel so tight. He was just a little nervous, because he has never been with girl before.

She made it easy for him. She made him forget that he was the king, that they were at war, that he loved someone else beyond measure. She laughed during and it made him laugh too. Only after, when he looked into her eyes, so similar to other, in which he looked for years, for all his life really, he felt his heart ache. And told himself that he should move on. That everything has changed. He knew that next time they'll see each other, they both will be different, oh, so different. That traces of boys they once were will be nowhere to be found.

 

_You were the one who initiated the kiss. You were twelve, Jon's lips were the colour of ripe cherries, even redder from the first goblet of wine you both ever drank. He stiffened when your lips touched lightly his mouth. '_

_Robb - ', he said, but didn't step back._

_You grabbed him by the neck and tried to push your tongue into his mouth (Theon insisted that it was how it worked; you didn't know where the Greyjoy boy gained that knowledge but you didn't ask.) Jon parted his lips slightly, allowing you to kiss him. It was clumsy, too much tongue, too much teeth, but it also was perfect. You felt dizzy, your knees were weak. You felt Jon's hand on the small of your back, holding you, supporting you, taking control._

_Before, that day, maester Luwin told you that your life, no matter how important, was just a stretch of mortal time. It scared you. It was the reason you stole the wine. But in the moment you kissed Jon, it didn't matter. You didn't care, because no matter how short or not, important or not, your life was meant to be, you wanted to spend it all with your brother._

 

He knew that no matter what he was going to do, he'll never break his promise.

***

He ended up marrying Talisa. Because he should, she might've been already holding his heir in her belly, after all. But also because he wanted to - she made him feel good, and if he had to spend his life with someone who wasn't his first choice, he preferred person he didn't dread. Person who gave him just a little resemblance of someone he once loved, so long ago, somewhere. And although he never stopped loving him, he never will, past recently became a blur of mixed images holding no meaning behind them. Names didn't connect with memories, memories didn't connect with emotions. He was the King in the North. He was at war. It was all he knew. It was all he could think about.

Sometimes he thought about Jon standing on the Wall, looking at what was hidden behind it, Ghost standing next to him. He wondered if his brother felt as alone as he did.

***

He heard first tones of Rains of Castamere resonating in the air. He smiled at Walder Frey, feeling ridiculously happy. After all, his wife was pregnant with his heir and with help of Freys, he was sure that he was able to conquer Casterly Rock. War didn't seem endless now; he believed that in few months he will be back in Winterfell. And everything will be alright.

'Robb!', screamed his mother and.

And everything turned into blur of crimson blood and white pain, and dizziness, and memories mixed with sight of his wife dying, and sound of Rains of Castamere over the screams of his dying men.

He didn't hear anything, he didn't see anything except for Talisa. Except for beautiful, innocent Talisa, laying there dying because he, as always, wanted to have something that couldn't - shouldn't - be his. Because he was just a boy pretending to be a king, leading his men to inevitable death. He closed his eyes for a moment.

 

 

_Jon was carrying Arya on his shoulders, training sword in her hand. She was killing some invisible monsters, Bran and Rickon cheering on her, Sansa observing with unimpressed face. You were watching them from the door, when you heard steps approaching. You turned to see your father; Lord Eddard Stark standed next to you and looked at rest of his children playing together in the chamber. He nodded, amused by Arya's nonsensical shrieks. Jon looked at you, curls plastered to his forehead, wide grin on his face. That's how you remembered them, that's how you remembered him._

 

He stood up, Jon's happy face still in front of his eyes. Lady Catelyn was screaming, threatening. He heard nothing of it. Rickon. Bran. Arya. Sansa. Jon. Father. Mother. Grey Wind.

He died with his direwolf's name on his lips, Rains of Castamere still resonating in the air, howling as it's companion.

 

_'Next time I see you, you'll be all in black,' you said. You never did._

**Author's Note:**

> I like pain. And the fact that Robb's romantic interest shared characteristics with Jon. And vice versa.;  
> Title taken from "Written In The Stars" by Elton John and LeAnn Rimes;  
> Unbeta'ed, all mistakes are mine;  
> I'm p-lahm on tumblr!;  
> Feedback? :)


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